The 11 Most Retarded Fictional Weapons

#5. The Ultimate Nullifier

Used By:

Reed Richards of The Fantastic Four.

Why It Could Be Cool:

It may not look like much, but when it comes to nullifying, there's no better nullifier on the market.

Why It Absolutely Is Not Cool:

It isn't that it can destroy anything at the speed of thought. It isn't that it looks like a camera from the twenties. It isn't even that the guy who made it--Galactus--is basically a god who shouldn't even need a weapon. It's that there isn't even a half-assed attempt to explain how it's supposed to work.

The mind-boggling schematic.

No pseudo-scientific jargon, no magic incantations, no nothing. It just nullifies. It's like they bought it from some dude in an alley. "Trust me, dude, if you need something nullified, this'll nullify it right up." The Ultimate Nullifier is especially effective against gaping plot holes.

So easy, even a baby can use it. Just point and nullify.

The Ultimate Nullifier is one of those fictional weapons that exists for no other reason than to resolve an unresolvable plot. The Fantastic Four, facing the near omnipotent Galactus, are basically given the Ultimate Nullifier by another near omnipotent being (The Watcher) and quicker than you can say deus ex machine, they use it to save the world. It's as if the writer of The Fantastic Four, Stan Lee, had dinner reservations and wanted to wrap the story up.

The Fantastic Four would go on to save the Earth again with the Total Eradicator (Stan Lee had Rangers tickets), the Super Eraser (when his brother was in town) and the Mighty Make-Bad-Thing-Go-Awayer (this time he just didn't give a shit).

#4. The Krull Glaive

Used By:

That dude in Krull.

Why It Could Be Cool:

It looks like a five bladed switchblade. And it's magic!

Why It Absolutely Is Not Cool:

The Krull Glaive is the magic weapon in the film Krull. The hero, Prince Colwyn, has to find the glaive, find the lair of the beast who has attacked his kingdom and kill it, all while maintaining his perfectly blow-dried hair and beard.

Like a lot of ridiculous fictional weapons, the obvious uselessness of the Krull Glaive is explained away by it being "magic." There have been weapons like this in history (like the African tribal weapon, the awesomely named hunga munga), but they all had something the Krull Glaive lacks: a fucking handle.

"It's like a Frisbee made of paper cuts."

How the hell are you supposed to throw this thing? Even if you use it in hand-to-hand combat, you're just as likely to hurt yourself as anyone else. No matter how you hold it, half the blades are pointed back at you. Seriously, we could have done a whole separate article on "fictional weapons that would cut your own fucking hand off."

#3. The Bat'leth

Used By:

Worf from Star Trek: The Next Generation and overweight guys dressed in homemade Klingon outfits everywhere.

Why It Could Be Cool:

It's wicked sharp, and you could probably do a lot of damage to a guy with it, provided he wasn't armed in any way.

Why It Absolutely Is Not Cool:

Never has a fictional weapon so beautifully illustrated the old adage, "never bring a knife to a gun fight." In a universe where phasers and disruptors are commonplace, why the hell would anyone carry around a boomerang so huge and heavy that it can't even do boomerang stuff?

Sure, you could impress your enemy with your cool bat'leth moves and wow him with how fast you can twirl it around, but once the rhythmic gymnastics display was over, all he has to do is pull an Indiana Jones and shoot your flailing ass.

The savage poetry of the bat'leth in action.

In fact, the bat'leth is an incredibly shitty weapon even by pre-gunpowder standards. It's clumsy, heavy and, because you need two hands to use it, it has almost no reach. You can go one handed to swing at your opponent, but that sends the other razor-sharp end directly at your own gut.

Sure, you could say the same about the cool two-bladed lightsaber in The Phantom Menace, but at least that could deflect lasers. The bat'leth can't even deflect the scorn your enemies will have for you for carrying the damn thing.

#2. The Gunsword

Never mind that emo kid up there looks like he could barely lift a hanky to dab away his tears at the end of Twilight, let alone a massive sword, what you're probably wondering is how the hell this thing even works.

Well, the gunsword is also a revolver, with a tiny barrel that runs the length of the blade. You may be thinking that revolvers are a hassle and why not make the sword automatic so it wouldn't take forever to reload, but that's really only scraping the surface of the how retarded the gunsword is.

Oh, by the fires of agony that swirl in my tortured heart, I declare this gunsword lamer than the last Cure album!

Want to use it as a gun? Well, too bad, you've got like 20 pounds of sword weighing down the barrel while you try to aim it with one hand. Want to put your hand on the end there to hold it up like a rifle? Congratulations, you've just joined the "I sliced off all my fingers with a fantasy weapon" club.

Want to use it as a sword? Also too bad, you've got to hold it by this idiotic little grip made for revolvers, and the first time you stab somebody you're going to get the tiny little barrel on the end crammed full of bad guy guts. So the next time you try to use it as a gun, it's going to blow your other hand off.

Pretty much the only use for this thing would be to mail it to the enemy the day before the battle in gift wrap, and pray they're stupid enough to use it.

#1. The Dalek Plunger

Used By:

The Doctor Who enemy, the Daleks. Also janitors, plumbers, housewives and, you know, anyone who needs to plunge.

Why It Could Be Cool:

The Daleks managed to conquer the universe countless times despite their inability to climb stairs, so they have to have something going for them.

...What is this show about?

Why It Absolutely Is Not Cool:

Records are spotty, and the stories told around campfires are probably more legend than fact, but every little Dalek soldier grows up listening to the tale of the ancient Dalek warrior Lenny, the resourceful janitor who used his plunger to single-handedly fend off an entire battalion of overflowing toilets in the Great Sewage War. From that day forth, no Dalek has ever gone to battle without their trusty plungers.

The plunger isn't the Dalek's main weapon--that would be the egg whisk thing to the left--but it's still pretty useful. It can open doors, move things and strangle people.

You know what else can do that? Hands. Why the Daleks chose to go with plungers over hands is never quite explained in the series but, then again, neither is the fact that they only have one eye that can easily be covered with a hat.

We don't know how close the Doctor Who universe is to ours, but if its most feared soldiers look like they were put together out of whatever was lying around the kitchen, we guess it can't be all that bad. No wonder an unarmed, eccentrically dressed British guy with a posh accent and a phone booth time machine is able to beat them so easily.